BATON ROUGE -- For the second time in less than two weeks, the LSU women's basketball team will play the No. 1-ranked team in the country, and this time Coach Van Chancellor thinks it matters even more.

"This is the game of the year in women's college basketball," he said.

Chancellor bestowed that label on tonight's matchup between top-ranked Connecticut (26-1, 13-1 Big East) and No. 6-ranked LSU (23-2, 12-0 SEC) at the Pete Maravich Assembly Center. It will be the third game, and the rubber match, for these two powerhouse programs in the past 12 months. The Huskies stormed from behind to beat LSU by a point when they visited Baton Rouge last year, only to see the Lady Tigers take them apart in the Elite Eight a month later and earn a trip to the Final Four.

Neither of those games matter now, though, according to Lady Tigers All-America center Sylvia Fowles. The senior said she hasn't been thinking about previous showdowns, or the words of UConn Coach Geno Auriemma. After watching Fowles play 39 minutes in which she had 23 points and 15 rebounds in LSU's NCAA Tournament victory over the Huskies, Auriemma wished that, "she go win a couple of championships and get the hell out of the college game."

"I haven't thought about that, but since you bring it back up, it is kind of funny," Fowles said with a laugh. "They're a whole new team, and I'm pretty sure they've cleaned up a lot of the things they did wrong when we played them in the Elite Eight, so it will be interesting to see how we go up against them (tonight)."

Auriemma has that champions aura that accrues to the game's top coaches. His Huskies have won five national titles, including three in a row from 2002 to 2004, and they appear poised to make another strong run at the crown this season. Only Rutgers -- in a 73-71 on Feb. 5 -- has nicked UConn this season, and the team arrives having whipped five consecutive opponents and averaging better than 80 points. They played just two days ago, but Chancellor said the Huskies, "didn't even break a sweat," as they annihilated St. John's 98-41.

LSU has a 14-game winning streak, including Feb. 14 when the Lady Tigers overcame a 19-point deficit to shock then-No. 1-ranked Tennessee 78-62 on its home court.

As Fowles and her fellow senior teammates noted, this is a much different team from the one LSU faced last season. While only one Huskies starter wasn't part of last season's team, that one starter has been a major factor. Freshman forward Maya Moore averages 18 points and has been selected Big East Freshman of the Week eight times, breaking the record set by former Huskies center Rebecca Lobo.

Maya has produced her eye-popping numbers -- she also averages 7.2 rebounds and has a .563 field-goal percentage -- in a lineup that has stayed strong, even after losing two returning starters to season-ending knee injuries. Two other starters, senior center Brittany Hunter and sophomore Tina Charles, also make more than half their shots.

"They're just good at everything," Chancellor said. "They run well, they shoot well, they score in transition, they score in the halfcourt; there isn't anything they don't do well."

There is one other thing they do well, he added, and that is play defense. In fact, the only team in NCAA women's basketball stingier than LSU is Connecticut. That could make for a physical game, and at practice Sunday the signs taped along the court and to the Lady Tigers' water coolers had capital letters reading "Boxout. Rebound." The mantra wafted repeatedly through the PMAC.

"That's not good enough," assistant head coach Bob Starkey said after a loose ball fight under the basket led to an out-of-bounds that went to the men's squad the women battle in practice. "That's the same thing as an offensive rebound. That's another possession for them."

Chancellor said the Huskies are perhaps the best offensive rebounding team he's ever seen and predicted the game could hinge on how many second-chance points the Lady Tigers allow. But it's also true that when LSU shoots 45 percent or better from the floor, it is 23-0.

The last time out, Kentucky fought the Lady Tigers to the final minute before succumbing 52-48 on Thursday. Shooting guard Quianna Chaney, who leads the SEC in 3-point field-goal percentage, made three of her 13 shots.

The job of dishing the ball to Chaney in the open court will fall to point guard Erica White, who has noticeably elevated her game over the past two months. Chancellor said she is playing the best basketball of her college career.

Like Fowles, White said the tournament game last March between these teams won't carry over tonight in terms of X's and O's. It instead will be a motivating factor for the Huskies.

"The only thing we can take from that is the final score, which tells you they are going to come here to play, and we'd better be ready to play initially," White said. "Oh, yes, they definitely remember that one more than we do."